Thanks to Andy Wilkes of Performance Parts Ltd who are the UK importers of Akrapovic Exhausts for the review loan of one of their amazing titianium GT-R exhaust systems.
I saw and heard Alex (Evolution)'s system at the Nurburgring in October and was impressed, but you really have to see the whole system and the way it's made to get the full picture.
Incredibly light, I couldn't believe how I could pick up a 5 foot long section almost with two fingers!
The welds are pure art and I love the mandrel bending (very rare for a titanium system). Look at the design and engineering that went into the support brackets!
I had the system fitted by my old friends at Autofficina in Chessington who normally work on Ferraris and Lamborghinis. Peter Ward did some superb engineering work on Godzilla 1 back in the day. He's a perfectionist who is not easily impressed and has worked with loads of F1 exhaust fabricators, but he said the Akrapovic was flat out the best "off the shelf" system he had ever seen.
The fitment was perfect and actually easier to install than the stock system was to take off.
All you can see is some subtly bigger tips, but the sound is smooth, refined and powerful. Slightly quieter in fact than my Milltek Y-pipe/stock cat-back combo.
But the amazing thing is, I could instantly tell it had freed up the breathing of the stock turbos!
Low end response is massively improved, for instance at 40mph in 4th gear, 2000rpm, a mere tickling of the throttle produced instant, massive grunt, (running of course the existing custom WG3 GTC/Thistle tune on the Cobb).
The car will be going back to Surrey Rolling Road as soon as Charlie can fit it in to see how many horses it has released, but I bet the area under the curve has noticeably increased.
I will see if I can upload some video clips in due course, but suffice it to say, I am very, very impressed.
I saw and heard Alex (Evolution)'s system at the Nurburgring in October and was impressed, but you really have to see the whole system and the way it's made to get the full picture.
Incredibly light, I couldn't believe how I could pick up a 5 foot long section almost with two fingers!
The welds are pure art and I love the mandrel bending (very rare for a titanium system). Look at the design and engineering that went into the support brackets!
I had the system fitted by my old friends at Autofficina in Chessington who normally work on Ferraris and Lamborghinis. Peter Ward did some superb engineering work on Godzilla 1 back in the day. He's a perfectionist who is not easily impressed and has worked with loads of F1 exhaust fabricators, but he said the Akrapovic was flat out the best "off the shelf" system he had ever seen.
The fitment was perfect and actually easier to install than the stock system was to take off.
All you can see is some subtly bigger tips, but the sound is smooth, refined and powerful. Slightly quieter in fact than my Milltek Y-pipe/stock cat-back combo.
But the amazing thing is, I could instantly tell it had freed up the breathing of the stock turbos!
Low end response is massively improved, for instance at 40mph in 4th gear, 2000rpm, a mere tickling of the throttle produced instant, massive grunt, (running of course the existing custom WG3 GTC/Thistle tune on the Cobb).
The car will be going back to Surrey Rolling Road as soon as Charlie can fit it in to see how many horses it has released, but I bet the area under the curve has noticeably increased.
I will see if I can upload some video clips in due course, but suffice it to say, I am very, very impressed.